Cheese and Wine in Noumea

A Photo interval. No pictures taken in Noumea ,think of this as an image break and enjoy the photo of the pretty boat. To be honest, we were busy

• Getting alongside in a very small space.  The Soren's first time touching dry land in Months.
• Acid cleaning the hull, followed by painting it.  There were tears, there was pain but in the end, the rust in above picture was gone!
• Eating cheese, baguettes, strawberries, pastries and other food New Cal inherited from the French. 
• Trying to find somewhere to skype family at night, but macca's wifi wasn't working and the yacht club turned it off early.  
• Feeling a little strange that this would be our final voyage after six months travel.

Noumea....well it made an impression. A lot of anti-social drinking, didn't seem to have a city centre and apparantly a Cappacino is a long black with squirty cream (yes I hear myself - I am a hot beverage snob).  However, it was dry land, only four crew members had to stay on board and therefore if you had no anchor watch in the next four hours, you were free!!! whether it was a couple of hours getting frustrated that there was no where open to use the internet, or a 10 minute visit to the nearest corner shop, you were free and thats all that mattered.

On our day off, We could have hopped on a bus and seen a little bit more of New Caledonia. We could have got to a beautiful beach and truly made the most of our last days in the South Pacific. Instead we did as listed above, bought some decent food from the supermache and feasted like kings.  With our not-so-little-picnic, we sat in a local park and bathed in the sunshine.

Our four days in Noumea went quickly and it wasn't long until all the new voyage crew were on board and we were getting ready for our final voyage.

In the direction of Sydney, we sailed...

* Picture taken on cook islands to samoa voyage.